Open History Society: Donald Trump a Jacksonian?

 Early during the first Trump administration, Donald Trump paid a visit to the Hermitage which is the former estate of our 7th POTUS Andrew Jackson. Jackson is well known for his treatment of our Indigenous Americans forcing then onto the "Trail of Tears" not allowing them to remain on their original territories and send them to what is now Oklahoma.

Pres. Trump saw a kindred spirit in Andrew Jackson as in 1828 President Jackson was a change in the character of most other presidents up to that point. Jackson probably could be described as America's first populist president. Trump in 2016 and again in 2024 could be seen as a populist president in our time.

This article from Open History Society explores in what ways that President Trump is Jacksonian. And then you have to get past biased statements as.

Meacham (2009) contends that Jackson was a principled idealist and there seems no doubt that his patriotic, arch-nationalist love of country was sincere. That notwithstanding, the highest virtue for Jackson was loyalty to himself. He judged that those who opposed him, such as John Quincy Adams and Henry Clay, were not just wrong but enemies of the people, a term employed by Trump against numerous political foes and the media (Smith, 2019). Jackson was a short-tempered man who held a grudge tenaciously, and whose moral code was centred upon an inflexible concept of honour which often led him into personal violence in his early life and propelled him sometimes into ill-advised dogmatism (Wyatt-Brown, 1997). Yet he had many friends and inspired a loyalty which was based on admiration of his sense of justice.

Trump’s character is far more dysfunctional, he is a serial liar, and his increasingly bombastic nationalism is essentially a projection of his own narcissism. He too demands loyalty, but unlike Jackson he rarely returns it. Allies pander to him for advancement or fear of falling out of favour. He is the archetypal bully. Jackson was an acerbic and aggressive character, but he could control his temper, unlike the thin-skinned Trump who is gratuitously abusive even to allies and colleagues. Jackson could be devious and less than truthful, but he was not a pathological liar. Innumerable accounts have catalogued Trump’s casual and unreflective telling of falsehoods. The Washington Post (2020) kept a record of these and revealed that in the first three years of his presidency he made 16,241 false or misleading statements, or 15 per day.

I have to keep reading this, but it's as good as an explanation as any about whether or not Trump or Jackson are similar. I also recognize that both men seemed to either engender great support or great dislike. As I stated Jackson even now has his detractors and even his supporters who cite that he paid off the national debt during his presidency among other accomplishments.

When you read this article what's your hottake?

Dave Morrison: My Honest Opinion Of The Week's Events

 

[VIDEO] Morrison of the YouTube channel Blue Collar Logic discusses the events of the past week. States that President Trump continuing to rail against Georgia Republicans over the elections process in the peach state. It might have helped to lose those two senate seats that were held by Republicans.

Also he noted Stacy Abrams. Do I think Republicans like Gov. Brian Kemp could've worked harder to  basically prove her wrong about Georgia being more purple? Yes I do, but that's neither here nor there. Morrison acknowledges that Stacy Abrams was able to show that Georgia is in fact a purple state and will be more in play as the future progresses.

Just think about this for a moment. The Atlanta area by itself is seeing an influx of migrants. That's been true for just about 30 years. My neighbors I just learned moved to Georgia, and excuse me for a generalization surely many of those new migrants, new residents are Blacks. 

Georgia will probably be more like Texas and Texas is a larger state. Probably for similar reasons which is migration. Joe Rogan and Elon Musk have moved their operations to Texas leaving California behind. I can't speak for Musk, however, Rogan himself have moved to Texas.

Anyway, let me get away from the detour Georgia proved to be the key unfortunately to Democrat control of the federal government. Trump wasn't able to prove with evidence widespread voter fraud and the ballgame is over. Morrison just decided that if Trump win in won't be a landslide as Trump himself stated, but it was likely he'd just have one term. I somewhat predicted this after the mudslinging fest of 2016 whoever won gets only one-term. With the chaos of 2020 I hoped I was wrong.

I think Morrison hit the nail on the head that Trump's very combative nature is why he will be out of office on January 20th. He did some awesome things like exposing our biased media, the monopoly of the tech companies, securing our borders, even trying to end our presence in the Mideast. 

We see in the news that Congress is looking into impeaching Trump even after he leaves office. Impeachment in and of itself won't keep Trump from running again in 2024, indeed they'd need to have another vote on that issue. I hope that he won't run again because at that point he'll be 78 years old when he would've completed a second term. Hopefully someone else will take up his populist movement during the next four years

The people's champ

I guess we could say we are certainly living in populist times. Donald Trump was a very unlikely presidential candidate somewhat representing a form of populism and then we have Bernie Sanders who represented a different form of populism. One form of populism proven more popular or potent than the other since one populist movement elected a man to the White House and the other well he couldn't even win his party's nomination.

Regardless, sometimes I have thought what if I combined two of my favorite past times or subjects professional wrestling and politics. What if I as a candidate sported a wrestling championship belt emblazoned with text "people's champ". Perhaps I as a candidate utilizing social media video could cut campaign speeches in the style of wrestling promos. Though I know I can't be violent in my speech, it would be important to cut through the cutter and present something different. Something the public wouldn't expect, worst case scenario is that this would be too different and I wouldn't be successful anyway

The people's champ could be a euphemism of populism, a people's movement. Say in Chicago, Illinois people are sick and tired of being taxes and having very little in return. Bad schools, awful public safety (as I wrote on my other blog downtown Chicago is even seeing an uptick in violent crimes), the costs of goods continuing to rise, etc. I'm sure people are having enough of this and perhaps there needs to be a people's champion in Chicago, Cook County or Illinois. Unfortunately in this year's primaries this candidate hasn't emerged, and sadly the Republicans aren't even woke.

I have very dubious graphic design/sketching skills but this people's champ belt would be done in the design of the big gold belt made famous by "The Nature Boy" Rick Flair during his time in WCW. Then I can imagine in script lettering "people's champ" on the front of the belt. Of course a championship belt isn't complete without an American or democracy or popular themed side plates. It should be designed well to really catch the eye of the public. Depending on the importance of this public figure any videos seen of this candidate - the so called people's champ - and the belt will hopefully be seen in a museum.

Big Gold Belt

I'm surprised that the President hasn't done such a thing as he has the money to do it. Perhaps he isn't as huge of a wrestling fan as I thought, especially since he literally fought Vince McMahon and was involved in shaving the WWE's owner's head. I could possibly relish Trump lifting that belt over his head during a campaign rally.

Well a wrestling fan can dream about the imagery of "sports entertainment" used in a political campaign. And I realize in publishing this post my idea could be snatched away from me. Oh well, and unfortunately I don't know when a future candidate will emerge who will truly become "the people's champ". Will be the political world's version of The Rock or Diamond Dallas Page who have been referred to during their wrestling careers as "the people's champ".

Perhaps I should realize this could be an idea that could backfire. Perhaps depending upon where you may attempt to run for office voters could be jaded to this idea. Then one may wonder how one could afford to create their own championship belt. There will be some questions, however, there is and will always be a way for those questions to not matter. Besides imagine a people's champ movement in populist politics.

Black populism

I briefly did a post on this a few years ago. While I hardly wrote much about that subject back then it was interesting that there was a populist movement of sorts among the former slaves of the south that predated the later civil rights movement in the next century. I briefly touched upon that over at E.M.

If you look at some of the bullet points shown in that old post from long ago many of what was advocated for aren't much different than they are today. There is still a need for Blacks to serve on juries - as unpleasant as that can be. We certainly need to raise money for school though these days the focus - for good or bad - is on the public schools.

I see some ideas with regards to economics in those bullet points though back in the 19th century most Black still lived in rural areas today many Blacks live in urban or suburban areas. So perhaps we need a Black populism in our urban areas. Don't have to go much further than see some of the neighborhoods of Chicago's south and west side. Just think that in the new year the latest controversy by a politico in Illinois was over discussion of "strategic gentrification". The violent crime, closing schools, foreclosures, etc are causing a certain segment of Chicago's population to leave and open the door to people of greater means to come in and make these areas what they will.

Perhaps the closest we got to a modern Black populism was the 1960s. The failed Seaway National Bank an emphasis on empowering economically Black communities especially when it comes to financial services since the major banks of the 1960s just Black people as a risk. It wasn't just about welfare or gov't programs & legislation it was about self-empowerment.

Perhaps this is the populism Blacks need today. I understand the need for Black Lives Matter, even if some aspects of their activism raises my eyebrows - case in point below [VIDEO]

So where are our Black business people? Who's got the bright ideas that would build up struggling Black communities? Where's the Black version of Donald Trump? Where are our populists?

Believe it or not we're living in populist times. Bernie Sanders as you saw above being confronted by Black Lives Matter activists in Seattle during 2016 is one sign of them. And also on the other end of the political spectrum we have Donald Trump who was elected President that year. Obviously voters who cast a ballot for Trump clearly rejected the establishment and the President as he still does on occasion speaks directly to the people. That is the essence of populism the people themselves may not have an ideology, but certainly the people want what they want.

Perhaps with the movie Black Panther having a successful opening weekend one thing to note is that the fiction Wakanda can be the model of what we hope Black communities anywhere can be. This is the Black populism I propose which is about economic empowerment. We can support a comic book movie that has a Black director and writer, we can certainly use that to build up our communities and turn them into economic powerhouses.